


maybe it's time

by deadlybride



Series: Milk Carton Kids [6]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Episode: s02e02 Everybody Loves a Clown, Gen, M/M, Season/Series 02, implied pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-05
Updated: 2016-07-05
Packaged: 2018-07-21 18:25:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7398568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deadlybride/pseuds/deadlybride
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>June 4, 2006. Sam resolves himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	maybe it's time

**Author's Note:**

> Milk Carton Kids - Live at Lincoln Theatre, track six

_Did you ever love someone so much that you can't explain?_  
_When you're with them it's like thunder keeps rolling through your brain._  
_Maybe you've had someone before, but this one is not the same;_  
_You feel it in the depths of your soul but you still can't bring yourself to say it—_

****

Dad's dead. Dad's dead and Sam is sitting hunched on the dusty couch in Bobby's living room, alone. His knuckles are sharp points of pressure, digging into his forehead. He takes in a deep breath. There’s a horrible heat behind his eyes and he clamps the heels of his palms down into them, grinding. He’s tired of crying. He doesn’t know how it got this bad. How everything went this wrong.

Dean’s out working on the Impala, again. Sam doesn’t know if he ever came in and slept. If he did, he certainly didn’t bother letting Sam know. Bobby has been orbiting the two of them at an awkward, careful distance. Sam appreciates it, kind of, but he also just wants—oh, _anything_ , any kind of distraction. He drags his hands through his hair, folds his fingers into a knot at the back of his neck.

Dad's dead and Jess is dead and Mom is dead, and Dean—God, Dean. He nearly slipped out of Sam's grasp no matter what he tried, no matter how he'd begged and prayed. What he'd almost lost—it's sour and thick in his gut, the nausea and panic rising when he considers how much worse it could've been. How much more alone he'd be now, in this sunny patch of light on a warm summer morning, if everything he cared about had ascended to the sky, columns of smoke and ash.

What’s wrong with him? Why is it that he always, always loses people? But, no—he shakes his head, shoves up to his feet. That’s selfish, stupid. Stupid way of thinking. Like he's the cog around which the universe spins. People die and other people are left behind. Happens every day. All that's left to do is mourn. And to get revenge, Sam thinks, trailing his fingers along the cracked-leather spine of one of Bobby's grimoires. Dad would've wanted them to keep going, to keep fighting, and Sam's going to. For the first time ever, he feels like he's on the same page as his family. It’s a relief.

He goes to the window, brushes aside the grimy lace curtain to find Dean out in the salvage lot, half-inside the remains of the Impala, bent over the engine block. It's only eleven in the morning but it's hot outside, South Dakota humid with the air so thick it's painful, and Dean's already sweated through his t-shirt. While Sam watches, he stands up straight, and light gleams on the back of his neck, over the small of his back when he hauls the hem of his shirt up to wipe his face. Probably covered in grease, Sam thinks—dark on his hands, across his cheekbone where he always seems to smear sweat, on the low-slung waist of his jeans, over his hips. He turns to grab something out of the toolbox and Sam can't see his face, but he can imagine that frown of concentration, the distracted distance in his eyes. The slice across his forehead that’s only just started to fade.

Dad’s been dead for a week. Jess has been gone for a year and a half. Almost as long as they were together, he thinks. His anger is the solid core of him, something deep in his gut that keeps him fighting, makes him work toward the vengeance they need. If it had been Dean, though, in the hospital—if he’d been forced to build the pyre, to wrap the body in linen, to light a fire and stand vigil through the smoke stinging his eyes, the smell of scorched meat, a horned amulet cutting bloody gouges into his palm not distraction enough from the way the world was burning, ending—

He swallows. Outside, Dean slams the hood back down, kicks the creeper into place and drops to his back, legs spread wide as he heels himself under the half-destroyed body of the car. Sam closes his eyes. Leans his forehead against the window, against glass warm from the sun. He’s got to get himself together. They need to get out there and start hunting things again. They need to stay sharp, honed and ready. Otherwise Sam’s going to go nuts here, he thinks, and opens his eyes again to watch Dean roll out from under the car, to watch him lie there under the sun for a second, an arm slung over his face. The light burnishes him to gold. Sam bites his lip, and turns away from the window. He needs to start going through Dad’s things. It’s time to get to work.


End file.
